I ran the Car tutorial and couldn’t tell the difference between light mapping on and off. Is light mapping analogous to creating the normal maps?
Also I am guessing mapping self illumination is for tron like effects?
Light mapping has nothing to do with normal mapping. It is a technique where one pre-calculates diffuse and ambient irradiance (incoming light) from static lights, and records it in a texture map. This map is used at runtime instead of recalculating the light result every frame. You can Google the concept for more information.
Self-illumination is for glowing surfaces that don’t emit dynamic light. The light mapper allows them to be taken into account, though.